Ukraine War News Today - Top Stories and Breaking Updates from Kyiv Post

Among them were the league’s top defenseman, three sets of brothers, a couple of rookies who exceeded expectations and a pipeline of potential future stars.

There were 29 players of Ukrainian descent skating in National Hockey League arenas in the recently completed 2024-25 season. Fifteen of the above players can be classified as frontline forwards and defensemen, six can be described as relevant contributors, another six are highly touted rookies who received a taste of the NHL, and two were minor leaguers who have seen better days.

The winner of the Norris Trophy (top defenseman) and First Team All-Star in 2024-25 was Colorado Avalanche defenseman Cale Makar (80 games played, 30 goals, 62 assists, 92 points) who is Ukrainian on his father’s side. This was Makar’s second Norris Trophy and his consistent point production and strong defensive acumen have drawn comparisons to Bobby Orr. He led all defensemen in goals, assists and points and is destined to continue adding hardware to his trophy case.

With all the hot wars in the news, tensions in the Caucasus area have been neglected. But pressure to keep a distance from Moscow continues unabated.

Armenia has become the epicenter of political and societal turmoil in recent months. Tensions between Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and the Armenian Apostolic Church have escalated sharply, triggering arrests of clergy members and opposition-linked billionaires, as well as mass protests across the capital Yerevan.

The crisis was sparked when Prime Minister Pashinyan publicly called for the resignation of Catholicos Karekin II, the spiritual leader of Armenia’s Apostolic Church. Pashinyan accused him of violating his vow of celibacy and fathering a child – a claim the Church vehemently denied.

Ukraine’s intrepid alpinist Antonina “Tonya” Samoilova gave a forthright and honest interview with the Kyiv Post about mountaineering, mountains, motivation, and more.

We met with Tonya Samoilova at the Kyiv Post offices shortly after she climbed Kangchenjunga – the third highest mountain in the world – the “woman killer.”

It was a conversation that impressed me as a journalist and as a man. It is not often that you get the opportunity to meet and talk openly with someone as bright as Tonya. The title “The Woman Who Stopped the Wind on Everest” came to mind unbidden during the conversation.

The SBU said two people were suspected of having killed Voronych, a man and a woman.

Russian secret service agents were killed on Sunday in the Kyiv region during an operation by Ukraine’s SBU intelligence agency to arrest them on suspicion of having shot dead an SBU colonel last week, Ukraine said.

In a statement on the Telegram messaging app, the SBU said it believed agents of Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) had been behind the killing of SBU colonel Ivan Voronych in Kyiv on Thursday and that it had tried to detain them on Sunday. 

There’s a reason why countries long to be in NATO. Apart from fearing Russia, they also understand that Russia’s alternative alliance has become a farce.

After a successful NATO summit at which member states agreed to increase their defense spending, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov lashed out, claiming that the increased spending was “disastrous” and would cause the “collapse” of the NATO alliance.

In psychology, it’s called projection – it is in fact Russia’s “mini-NATO,” the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), is on shaky ground. Last week, during the regular meeting of the CSTO Council of Foreign Ministers in Kyrgyzstan, Russia’s ally Armenia did not even show up as the Armenian foreign minister was busy meeting with a representative from the European Union in Yerevan.

Last week, Ukraine bid farewell to a legend of Ukrainian culture, a poet and activist for independent Ukraine: Ihor Kalynets (July 9, 1939 – June 28, 2025).

The Ukrainian resistance movement of the second half of the 20th century (1960s-1980s) is an important page in the history not only of Ukraine but of all Central and Eastern Europe.

It was formed mainly by young, intelligent, courageous, and talented people from different parts of Ukraine who cared deeply about the country, its culture, and history. They chose the path of exploring their Ukrainian identity and developing their national and civic identity.

Lavrov’s visit to North Korea was the latest trip by top Moscow officials as both countries deepen military and political ties amid Russia’s war against Ukraine.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un offered Moscow his full support for their war in Ukraine during talks with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, Pyongyang state media said Sunday.

Lavrov’s visit to North Korea was the latest in a series of high-profile trips by top Moscow officials as both countries deepen military and political ties amid Russia’s offensive against Kyiv.

The economic arguments for using seized Russian Central Bank assets to sustain Kyiv’s fight outweigh the excuses of Russian retaliation and European reserve currency devaluation, which fall flat.

The economic arguments around using immobilized Central Bank of the Russian Federation (CBR) assets for Ukraine can be reasoned from the perspectives of costs and investment in Europe’s future, while the excuses of Russian retaliation and European reserve currency devaluation fall flat.

The cost argument

* European taxpayers cannot/should not be expected to pay the full bill for defending Ukraine and funding reconstruction – it is morally and politically untenable.

Tencore, a Ukraine-based developer of unmanned ground vehicles, signed the deal with the largest international investor working in Ukraine’s DefenseTech ecosystem.

The Ukrainian-American investment group MITS Capital invested $3.74 million in TerMIT ground drone manufacturer Tencore, which became the 11th company to join the investment group’s portfolio. 

Tencore, a Ukraine-based developer of the multi-mission unmanned ground vehicle (UGV) platform TerMIT, signed the deal with MITS Capital during the Ukraine Recovery Conference (URC2025) in Rome on Friday, the press release says. 

Former US Ambassador to Tbilisi asserts that such a move “had to have been sanctioned at fairly high levels in the Georgian government.”

WASHINGTON DC – Maggie Osdoby Katz, an American consultant and former US diplomat with decades-long ties to Georgia, was unexpectedly denied entry upon her arrival at Tbilisi International Airport on Saturday, July 12.

The incident, described by Georgia watchers as “the first of its kind” for an American citizen without apparent reason, underscores a rapidly deteriorating relationship between Washington and Tbilisi. Speaking to Kyiv Post, a former US Ambassador to Georgia characterized the move as a “particularly pointed message” from the South Caucasian country’s pro-Russian government and a concerning signal for democracy advocates.

Ukrainian Police Force used an inexpensive airborne interceptor drone to take down an expensive Russian Reconnaissance drone that coordinates attacks in air-to-air kill.

On the Toretsk front, troops from the Khyzhak (Predator) brigade of the Ukrainian Patrol Police Department destroyed a Russian ZALA reconnaissance drone system using an interceptor UAV.

According to Ukrinform, this was reported by Deputy Head of the Patrol Police Department Oleksii Biloshytskyi on Telegram, where he also published the video footage.